The invention relates to an apparatus and method for picking up objects randomly distributed on a surface, such as nuts on the ground.
In both commercial and personal activities, situations occasionally arise where randomly distributed objects on some surface, typically on the ground, must be picked up and placed in some recepticle. Tennis and golf balls, which accummulate during practice, are one example. The harvesting of fruits and nuts is another.
Nuts are typically harvested by the owner of one or a few trees by simply allowing the nuts to fall to the ground and then picking them up by hand where they lie. Owners of some kinds of orchards can utilize machines which shake the trees to dislodge the nuts or fruit which then fall onto a canvas sheet or the like which collects them.
Other nuts, such as pecans, are typically harvested only after they have fallen onto the ground. Mechanical devices with fingers which can be opened and closed permit individual nuts to be picked up one at a time without stooping over. Obviously, collection of nuts in this fashion is time consuming and tedious.
Mechanical harvesters are also utilized which simply pick up by way of vacuum everything loose beneath the tree and then separate the leaves, the sticks and dirt from the nuts which are then placed in a basket or the like. Such devices are complex and expensive. In addition, they typically miss some of the nuts on the ground and require that the ground be substantially clean before harvesting.
The present invention relates to a unique method and apparatus which will effectively and efficiently pick up objects randomly distributed on a surface, for example, nuts on the ground. The device is formed of a plurality of coaxially mounted, flexible, cylindrical discs which are separated from adjacent discs by flexible spacers. The discs and spacers form a wheel which is rotated over the ground so that the nuts become wedged in the spaces between adjacent discs and rotate with the wheel. Structure for ejecting the nuts from the spaces, preferably into a basket or the like, is mounted on the device above the ground so that nuts rotating with the wheel are ejected as they encounter the ejector.
The apparatus of the present invention will operate even in tall grasscontaining debris such as with sticks, leaves and the like, picking up only very minimal amounts of the unwanted debris. The apparatus is simple and is readily adaptable to hand operation by an owner of only a few trees or mechanized operation for large scale harvesting.
For a manually operated device, the wheel is preferably mounted to a handle which also mounts a number of rods extending into the spaces between the discs and serving to eject the wedged objects into a basket pivotally mounted on the handle. The basket can be moved between a collection and a dump position for easily removing the collected nuts or other objects.
Other objects and purposes of the invention will be clear from the following detailed description of the drawings.